As members of the Darfur Action Committee pick their new leaders
and the University of California Divestment Taskforce looks ahead
to more state and national targets of divestment, the partner
groups will lose two of the students who have been essential to
their success.
The UCLA DAC and the UC Divestment Taskforce have been led by
two graduating seniors who have left their mark on the groups by
encouraging the UC to divest from Sudan, a decision UC officials
and state policy makers have largely attributed to students’
efforts.
The divestment movement started out with the age-old goal of
student activism ““ raising awareness for a cause. It soon
developed into a systemwide campaign to stop UC money from going to
companies invested in Sudan. The Sudanese government is engaged in
a conflict in the Darfur region, labeled genocide by Congress, that
has killed an estimated 400,000 people, displacing many more.
Graduating students Adam Sterling and Lindsey Hilde have been
with the movement since its early stages, leading the group from
its campuswide roots to its current nationwide campaign.
Adam Sterling, head of the task force and an African studies
student, joined DAC shortly after it was formed. His interest
stemmed from a class about the Rwandan Genocide and research he did
on the “never again” rhetoric, which came into being
after the Holocaust to refer to the idea that the world could never
let genocide happen again.
Lindsey Hilde, a fourth-year political science student, became
involved in DAC around the same time, and like Sterling was
affected by the memory of the Holocaust.
“I’m Jewish, and the Holocaust has been something
that has been a part of my life forever,” she said.
“Saying “˜never again’ means never
again.”
Hilde worked with DAC to build a coalition of student groups to
get people to the regents’ meetings. “I was doing
everything from picking up the speakers from the airport (to)
organizing the program (to) advertising,” she said.
Sterling said he never expected the movement to get so big. The
campaign at UCLA picked up in March 2005 when actor Don Cheadle
came to speak on campus. They then spent the summer putting
together a divestment plan, Sterling said. In March, the regents
voted to divest UC funds from nine companies with holdings in
Sudan.
The UC response to the proposal to divest changed dramatically
over the past year. UC spokesman Trey Davis told the Daily Bruin in
November that “this Board of Regents has decided its
investment decisions on the basis of financial criteria.”
But less than four months later, divestment task force members
found themselves negotiating with regents and also in the UC Office
of the President as part of a broader task force the regents
organized to propose a viable divestment option, Sterling said.
He said the success of this student group lies in the extensive
research they did to understand the more technical economic aspects
of divestment and developing press contacts, which backed up their
mobilization and call to action.
“We weren’t just students holding up signs,”
Sterling said.
The national campaign for divestment eventually reached the ears
of the Sudanese government. In a letter written to the U.S., the
Sudanese ambassador expressed a “deep concern with the
campaign to force U.S. entities to divest themselves from any
business operations that involve Sudan.”
The group has attracted extensive press coverage and
endorsements from many politicians.
“It could be a model for student activism in the 21st
century,” Sterling said.
The campaign will continue advocating for state and local
divestments next year and has launched a new awareness campaign,
Sterling said.
Hilde will be doing a public-affairs fellowship next year, but
said she will continue her involvement with the cause that has
broadened her interest internationally and made volunteering a
habit.
Sterling was accepted to the African Studies master’s
program at UCLA but has also been offered a full-time job doing
what he does now as a student activist. He has yet to decide his
next move, but said the divestment task force changed his path in
life after college.
“I still plan on continuing with this,” he said.
“Two summers ago, I took the LSAT, but now I haven’t
even applied.”